many, many, moons.
Orange city lights spread out like a sequined quilt in the dark of the New Mexican desert.
I breath in, and I can smell the spines of the saguaro cactus, that the wind ran curious fingers over, before it made it's way up the hill and into my lungs. I watch the valley, feeling grateful to be up, to have the perspective on the city.
My feet itch. I am impatient for this night, but time is moving too fast.
I feel a victim of the day- torn away from moments I have waited for with such great expectation and spun, instead, into shadows of time like deep wet sand.
My mind moves back, to a time when I sat on a dark roof, the chilly colorado evening air enwrapping my companion and myself in deep shadows as we watched the beginning of the silver moon rise, pregnant and full over the mountains that have always been my home.
My mind jumps to other nights, other shadowy companions, both foreign and familiar, other moon rises: The full moon rising so round and red in the rearview mirror of my friend Luke's truck, driving up, out of the twilighted city of Denver. I was just coming home Italy, where I had been under that very same moon. I remember the intense feeling of relief I had watching that moon, such intense relief at being safe again.
Other moons flash through my mind, early morning moons, pale against the sky of morning seen through the windshield, my body tired, sweaty and happy from a long night of dancing, a pale hand upon mine as we share in quiet, the road humming away beneath us.
The city is brightening as the desert grows darker, in a far off way I can hear the whoosh of the interstate and the faint hum of a motorcycle.
I hug my knees to me and take another deep breath. Exhaling out the particles of weight that seem to be clinging to my heart and lungs; particules that have only showed themselves after 8 hours of driving and ten hours of dancing.
I can feel the exhaustion in my body, resting in my muscles, stretching across my back and through my shoulders. Three hours of sleep a night is beginning to take it's toll.
But I can also feel the hum of contentment in my body, that only dancing brings, it feels like a hundred fireflies harmonizing on the empty wind.
I am driven to find perfection. I am driven to make something good, real, deep and rich of myself. I am drivin too much, because in the honestly of the evening air, I know the truth, and the truth is that perfection is completely elusive, in the end, it doesn't mean anything.
What matters is that we speak the words within us, that we live the life within us with gratitude. That we stop worrying about faults and mistakes.
In the end, we are the end.
Sand presses against the bottom of my bare feet and I gently move my left foot across the earth. I know my time here on the edge of the night is coming to an end and I must soon rise and go.
We might as well be authentic and real in ourselves for the short and unknown time we are given.
Each foot step in the sand is a map for the lives we are choosing to live.
Each struggle is a stairway to a bright breakthrough.
And perfection is a silly human concept, that although lovely to think on, is not actually as beautiful as we think it should be.
Our flaws, joys and battle scars are what makes us beautiful.
Up above me I see the spokes of the stars swinging westward, and there, hanging on the western horizon, is the waxing shape of the moon. Steady and familiar as anything.
The dance is calling me onward.
I rise, leaving the desert to it's secrets.
I breath in, and I can smell the spines of the saguaro cactus, that the wind ran curious fingers over, before it made it's way up the hill and into my lungs. I watch the valley, feeling grateful to be up, to have the perspective on the city.
My feet itch. I am impatient for this night, but time is moving too fast.
I feel a victim of the day- torn away from moments I have waited for with such great expectation and spun, instead, into shadows of time like deep wet sand.
My mind moves back, to a time when I sat on a dark roof, the chilly colorado evening air enwrapping my companion and myself in deep shadows as we watched the beginning of the silver moon rise, pregnant and full over the mountains that have always been my home.
My mind jumps to other nights, other shadowy companions, both foreign and familiar, other moon rises: The full moon rising so round and red in the rearview mirror of my friend Luke's truck, driving up, out of the twilighted city of Denver. I was just coming home Italy, where I had been under that very same moon. I remember the intense feeling of relief I had watching that moon, such intense relief at being safe again.
Other moons flash through my mind, early morning moons, pale against the sky of morning seen through the windshield, my body tired, sweaty and happy from a long night of dancing, a pale hand upon mine as we share in quiet, the road humming away beneath us.
The city is brightening as the desert grows darker, in a far off way I can hear the whoosh of the interstate and the faint hum of a motorcycle.
I hug my knees to me and take another deep breath. Exhaling out the particles of weight that seem to be clinging to my heart and lungs; particules that have only showed themselves after 8 hours of driving and ten hours of dancing.
I can feel the exhaustion in my body, resting in my muscles, stretching across my back and through my shoulders. Three hours of sleep a night is beginning to take it's toll.
But I can also feel the hum of contentment in my body, that only dancing brings, it feels like a hundred fireflies harmonizing on the empty wind.
I am driven to find perfection. I am driven to make something good, real, deep and rich of myself. I am drivin too much, because in the honestly of the evening air, I know the truth, and the truth is that perfection is completely elusive, in the end, it doesn't mean anything.
What matters is that we speak the words within us, that we live the life within us with gratitude. That we stop worrying about faults and mistakes.
In the end, we are the end.
Sand presses against the bottom of my bare feet and I gently move my left foot across the earth. I know my time here on the edge of the night is coming to an end and I must soon rise and go.
We might as well be authentic and real in ourselves for the short and unknown time we are given.
Each foot step in the sand is a map for the lives we are choosing to live.
Each struggle is a stairway to a bright breakthrough.
And perfection is a silly human concept, that although lovely to think on, is not actually as beautiful as we think it should be.
Our flaws, joys and battle scars are what makes us beautiful.
Up above me I see the spokes of the stars swinging westward, and there, hanging on the western horizon, is the waxing shape of the moon. Steady and familiar as anything.
The dance is calling me onward.
I rise, leaving the desert to it's secrets.
